Illustrators with Ink

Illustrators with Ink: Nomi Chi

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For my lat­est install­ment of Illus­tra­tors with Ink, Van­cou­ver-based illus­tra­tor and tat­too artist Nomi Chi is shar­ing her ink and draw­ings. She has a fan­tas­tic artis­tic style, and I’m espe­cial­ly fond of her tattoos—they have the spon­tane­ity and dynamism of pen­cil sketch­es! (All of the tat­toos you see here is work that Nomi has etched on her clients.)

So, with­out fur­ther ado, here’s Nomi!
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How did you get in to tat­too­ing? Did you ever envi­sion your­self doing it?
I had a very flu­id and relaxed appren­tice­ship, most of what I know I’ve learned through obser­va­tion or through the gen­er­al dif­fu­sion of knowl­edge that comes with work­ing with peo­ple more expe­ri­enced than me. I began tat­too­ing quite young, but I nev­er imag­ined my work would be sought-after, at least not to the degree that it is today.
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How much of your time is spent tat­too­ing and how much of it is spent illustrating?
Most of my time is spent either tat­too­ing or doing prepara­to­ry draw­ings for tat­toos. In the future, I would like to be illus­trat­ing more.

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How does your illus­tra­tion style trans­late into tat­too­ing? Do you see much of a dif­fer­ence between the two?
I try not to illus­trate the way I tat­too. Both prac­tices share the same ves­sel (me), so there is going to be some cross-pol­li­na­tion, but at the moment I try to keep them rel­a­tive­ly com­part­men­tal­ized. Tat­too­ing is not only a tech­ni­cal­ly restric­tive medi­um, it inher­ent­ly involves the pref­er­ences, desires and vision of anoth­er per­son. In my illus­tra­tive work I try to explore themes and tech­ni­cal pos­si­bil­i­ties that I could not/would not in tat­too­ing. Tat­too­ing has its own won­der­ful qual­i­ties and does not have to look like illus­tra­tion to be visu­al­ly appealing.

Nomi Chi tattoo

Your tat­toos are beau­ti­ful and feel like ener­getic sketch­es. What are the inspi­ra­tion behind the tat­toos you cre­ate? Are most of them your vision? If not, how much input do clients typ­i­cal­ly give?
My inter­est in visu­al art was spurred by ani­ma­tion, so cap­tur­ing move­ment is impor­tant to me. I also strive to impli­cate a kind of imme­di­a­cy in my my tat­toos, so there’s a lot of impro­vi­sa­tion — It keeps the process fresh and fun for me. I’m glad my clients like it too, of course!
As for sub­ject mat­ter, that’s usu­al­ly pro­vid­ed by my client. I am often giv­en room to apply my own kind of twist to the con­cept as well.

Nomi Chi tattoo

Nomi Chi tattoo

What is the most mem­o­rable tat­too you’ve given?
The first tat­too I made on anoth­er per­son. The expe­ri­ence is etched into me like a sig­il. I remem­ber every detail of the room we were in, it’s sur­re­al how clear­ly I can recall that moment.

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What’s the inspi­ra­tion for your illustrations?
Lumpy things, fleshy-ness, squishy hairy things, feel­ings, fem­i­nism, desire, death — not nec­es­sar­i­ly in that order.

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How long have you been illustrating?
Gosh, I don’t know. I learned at a young age that there are peo­ple out there who will pay mon­ey and give me praise and atten­tion for draw­ings, so I’ve been hus­tling art for about as long as I can remember.

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Any excit­ing projects on the horizon?
I am very soon releas­ing a sketch­book of sorts, in an uncon­ven­tion­al and excit­ing for­mat, with my pub­lish­er von­zos! I’ll def­i­nite­ly be talk­ing it up all over my social media pages as the release date draws near, so keep your eyes peeled.

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What tools do you use for cre­at­ing your work?
Late­ly I’ve been return­ing to clas­sic illus­tra­tion sta­ples: pen, ink, gouache, etc. But I’m also into CNC­ing sculp­tures from MDF board and paint­ing them, and build­ing fig­urines with Sculpey.

Thanks, Nomi! Make sure you fol­low her on Insta­gram to keep up with her work.